


A Worsening Decision

by Val_Creative



Series: Kinktober/Whumptober/Goretober 2020 [7]
Category: The Goldfinch (2019)
Genre: Adult Theodore Decker/Boris Pavlikovsky, Alternate Universe - Canon, Bruises, Carrying, Childhood Friends, Cock Tease, Developing Relationship, Explicit Language, Friends to Lovers, Goretober, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, Kinktober, Kinktober 2020, M/M, Minor Violence, POV Boris Pavlikovsky, Past Suicide Attempt, Protectiveness, Rimming, Romance, Sexual Fantasy, Whump, Whumptober, Whumptober 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-07
Updated: 2020-10-07
Packaged: 2021-03-07 21:27:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26884381
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Val_Creative/pseuds/Val_Creative
Summary: Theo can not be left alone again. Boris still sees the gleam of self-destruction lingering in his eyes.
Relationships: Theodore Decker/Boris Pavlikovsky
Series: Kinktober/Whumptober/Goretober 2020 [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1949473
Comments: 8
Kudos: 64
Collections: Kinktober 2020, Whumptober 2020





	A Worsening Decision

**Author's Note:**

> I got to introduce this movie to my best friend Conner and god damn I love rewatching it. They're the softest and messiest fuckers. My heart is soft. Please accept my newest offering to this fandom and any thoughts/comments I would love to hear!

*

"How do you want him taken care of?"

The softly spoken question reverberates off Boris's lips. 

He maneuvers Theo onto a booth-end, sitting him down. 

Boris pulls off his long, suede jacket, holding it out to Gyuri who nods and folds over his arm. 

The _darkest black_ has always been Boris's color.

Rage feels estranged to him, Boris thinks. Perhaps it is a result of Volodymyr Pavlikovsky's abuse, or what comes naturally to him. Boris tends to dismiss the risk of worsening decisions and shield himself with humor. It's just how it is. When he truly is angry, Boris's entire face twists into a scowl. His Ukrainian accent deepens. Everything around Boris seems to _rumble_ like a thunderclap.

"It's fine, Boris," Theo croaks. He hangs his head, looking down ruefully to his knuckles bruising emerald. "I started it."

Boris understands why it happened… Kitsey Barbour, Theo's fiancee, has been cheating on Theo for several years and _fell in love_ with another man. Even if Theo didn't love her as Theo himself expected to, Kitsey weaved _secrets_. She betrayed his trust.

Returning from Amsterdam, Boris settled his affairs and repaid a foreign drug trafficker for his information and planned to stay in New York. For however long it took. Theo could not be left alone _again_. Boris can still see the gleam of self-destruction lingering in his eyes. He didn't even allow Theo to piss without him a whole day after unsuccessfully killing himself.

Meeting Theo after years and years of separation… one may call it an accident or coincidence. Boris calls it what it is.

_ Fate. _

Fate led him to the same street where a clearly frustrated Theo gets into a loud argument with a hysterical, red-faced Kitsey clawing at Theo's face. Boris witnessed Kitsey's lover punch Theo for elbowing Kitsey aside. Theo punched him back and across the jaw. Both men ended up rolling onto the gravel, wrestling, yelling out aggressively. It happened so quickly.

Boris nudged past Kitsey who gawked open-mouthed in horror. He aimed a kick for the other man's ribs, breaking one or two and not wasting time to rescue Theo. Boris's pistol jammed painfully hard under the lover's chin. The safety clicked off.

Theo, lying on his back, wheezed through a mouthful of blood. He half-waved his hand to a glaring Boris.

_ Stop. _

Boris scoffs. 

"He started it by lying about the cigarettes and getting you into trouble."

Theo's mouth curls up.

"Tom Cable isn't worth jail," he murmurs, correcting the angle of his eyeglasses. One of the lenses fractured. Theo's upper lip scabs in rigid, red blotches. His jaw blisters. A multitude of cuts cover Theo's forehead and the left side of his face.

"Who said I would go to jail?" Boris says, masking his irritation in an amused grin.

He snaps his fingers high above him without looking away from Theo, ordering something in Russian.

Gyuri nods silently, marching out.

Anyone left lingering in the main bar scurries towards the exits.

Boris kneels in front of Theo, reaching out and cradling Theo's head in his palms. Theo sighs out Boris's name as if protesting, his eyes lidding shut. No matter. Boris ignores him, keeping a firm and methodical examination, gently tilting Theo's neck.

"Potter, you hold still… or I'll hold you down _myself_ …"

Theo raises his eyebrows high, opening his eyes and mock-clucking his tongue.

" _Mm_. Sorry. You shouldn't make promises you can't keep," he declares, wincing through his low laughter.

Boris echoes him, grinning hard until his pale, thin features squint. That sounds nice. Holding Theo down on a stretch of soft surface. Boris imagines his mattress. He imagines a gasping Theo dripping in his own hot sweat, wonderfully nude and unbruised, arching in Boris's hands. Feeling Theo's cock dragging on his. Feeling an orgasm building and flooding out of him.

(Imaginings weren't the last time they found pleasure together. Boris hopes the last wouldn't be last.)

Gyuri stomps in, hoisting up an ice bag and a towel.

" _Da_ ," Boris mumbles, waiting for an obedient nod. He unravels the towel, switching back to English, "Do you remember July?"

At first, Theo stares at him in confusion. 

It takes a moment but realization brightens Theo's expression. 

Boris remembers it _all_. 

He remembers the dry heat within Nevada's skies. The glowing illumination of cherry red and white and blue in Theo's hair.

"The illegal fireworks?" Theo whispers. The corner of his mouth twitches up. "Middle of the night… you came and got me, right? We drank and we drank _and we drank_ until I could barely stand… and somehow still I could light them, Boris. That was the stupidest _fucking_ thing we could have done." Boris packs the towel with ice. "We could have set an entire town on fire."

"I do not disagree," Boris says conversationally.

He kneels up further, holding the back of Theo's head and pressing the ice against one of the larger facial-bruises. Theo jerks away, flinching and cursing through his teeth, as Boris shushes him. The fat of Boris's thumb massages against Theo's scalp.

"Let someone take care of you for once, Potter…"

Theo groans, snatching the item from Boris and inhaling. As if mentally preparing himself. He repeats what Boris did, pressing the towel-ice against his jaw and keeping it there with his hands. Theo shakes violently in place, hunching over.

Boris knows _agony_. The raw marks and welts from getting shot in the chest comes close.

(Thank goodness for bullet-resistant vests.)

"Stay still," he warns Theo. 

Boris gathers him into his arms awkwardly, hauling him bridal-style against his chest and seeing Theo's eyes widen. 

A laugh reluctantly escapes Boris. He heads them towards the back-rooms, into a darkened stairwell, and onto one of the upper floors. Theo would be safest here with him, Boris mentally insists. He's sure of this.

Theo stretches out on a old, musty cot. His boots still on. He drops the towel, locking eyes with Boris and relaxes. 

Theo's fingertips trail over his belt-buckle. 

Boris eyes him, torn between helping him or _biting_ Theo's hand until he quits teasing.

_A worsening decision_. Boris knows plenty of those.

"So… you're doubling as a crime lord and _a nanny_ these days, Boris…" Theo mutters, smiling. His fingers drift to his navel, and then his belt and the seam of his finely stitched trousers, and Boris wonders if Theo drawing attention to his cock is on purpose.

Boris seats himself on the cot's edge, flattening a hand to the other side of Theo's head and leaning over

"If I wanted to fuck you, Potter," he says coolly. "I would fuck you… and I would fuck you until you were mine…"

"Then why aren't you?"

Instead of pure self-destruction, Theo has a challenge gleaming in his eye.

Boris could. He could fulfill that need. Strip him down and work Theo until he's pleading and writhing against Boris's lips. His muscles clenching when Boris eats him out, panting on Theo's little, hairy rim and tonguing him open.

"… You're still someone else's," Boris says quietly. Theo huffs, dismissive, but blinking tears into existence.

_ "No." _

"But one day, I will. I will fuck you all you want to, Potter."

"Changed my mind," Theo mutters, smiling and turning his head on the pillow.

Boris laughs, flashing his teeth.

"Of course."

*

**Author's Note:**

> Kinktober 2020 prompt(s): **Rimming**  
>  Whumptober 2020 prompt(s): **Support, Carrying**  
>  Goretober 2020 prompt(s): **Bruises**


End file.
